- New York's Hinchey A Champion for Utah Wilderness
- Oregon's Furse Leads Fight to Repeal Salvage Rider
- Illinois' Porter a Genuine GOP Environmentalist
- Georgia's McKinney Faces Tough Election in Redrawn District
- Ward Top Advocate for Environment from Bible Belt
- Minnesota's Wellstone Most Vulnerable Pro-Environment Senator
New York's Hinchey A Champion for Utah Wilderness
From the moment he arrived in Washington from his upstate
New York district, Rep. Maurice Hinchey has been one of
Congress' most ardent defenders of wilderness. He is also
among its most vulnerable members, with special interests
digging deep into their pockets to prevent his re-election.
It's easy to see why. From his seat on the House Resources
Committee, Hinchey has fought vigorously to protect public
lands from the majority - led by rabidly pro-development
chairman Don Young (R-Alaska) - who would hand them over to
extractive industries. He has compiled one of the best
environmental voting records in the House, unfailingly
putting public lands and public health before the profits of
corporate polluters.
But the two-term New York congressman has made his most
memorable stand on behalf of the wilds of Utah. He not only
led the opposition to an egregious anti-wilderness measure
pushed by Utah's congressional delegation, but authored a
true wilderness bill - H.R. 1500, America's Red Rock
Wilderness Act - based on a citizens' proposal by the Utah
Wilderness Coalition, which includes the Sierra Club. That
kind of independence has not endeared him to timber, mining
and oil companies, which are eager to move on millions of
acres of incomparable wild lands. Having won a second term
in 1994 by barely 1,200 votes, Hinchey clearly needs our
help in '96. Clearly, we'll need his as well.
Send contributions to:
Friends of Maurice Hinchey
P.O. Box 4497
Kingston, NY 12402
(914) 331-4466
Oregon's Furse Leads Fight to Repeal Salvage Rider
Like her colleague from the Northeast, Maurice Hinchey,
Oregon's Elizabeth Furse has built a four-year record as one
of the environment's staunchest allies in Congress - and
distinguished herself as a leader in a public-lands battle
of national import. Rated one of the House's greenest
members by the League of Conservation Voters, she has beenat
the forefront of efforts to halt the anti-environment march
of the 104th Congress.
In her position on the House Commerce Committee, Furse has
been a tireless advocate for public health, battling to
strengthen the beleaguered Superfund hazardous-waste cleanup
program. She has also fought for legislation that would
protect endangered salmon and promote community-based
projects to restore rivers and streams. If ever
environmentalists needed Furse's leadership, however, it was
in the struggle for America's forests. Determined to end the
timber industry's orgy of old-growth harvesting in the wake
of last year's "logging without laws" salvage-logging rider
- among the most devastating bills passed by Congress in a
generation - she introduced a measure to repeal it. Her
courage earned her the lasting gratitude of the nation's
environmentalists, as well as the enmity of its timber
companies.
Furse shares something else with Hinchey, too: She won
reelection in 1994 by just 301 votes. If she is to survive
the gathering storm from timber PACs, she'll need support
from all of us who want the nation's forests to survive the
assault from "logging without laws."
Send contributions to:
Furse for Congress
P.O. Box 11688
Hillsborough, OR 97123
(503) 227-4882
Illinois' Porter a Genuine GOP Environmentalist
A member of the Republican majority in the 104th Congress,
Rep. John Porter has been among the intrepid minority of
genuine GOP environmentalists. He has emerged in his ninth
term as an important mediator between the environmental
community and the Republican leadership, and as a moderating
influence on the cynical, bottom-line ethos of those who
have commandeered the party of Teddy Roosevelt.
Porter's green credentials are reflected in votes to block
his own leadership's back-door attacks on the Environmental
Protection Agency, to prevent increased logging on public
lands and to scuttle the "Dirty Water Bill," H.R. 961, the
majority party's answer to the Clean Water Act. He also
fought a destructive "takings" bill in the House, which
would have forced taxpayers to reward corporate polluters
for complying with laws that protect America's air, land,
water and public health.
As the second-ranking Republican on a key House
Appropriations panel - the Foreign Operations subcommittee,
which controls the purse strings for sustainable population
and development assistance around the world - Porter has
resisted the calls from his party's top leaders to cut
funds, consistently making the case that family planning is
vital to preserving traditional family values. He was
instrumental in preventing congressional passage of the so-
called Mexico City Policy, which would have crippled the
federal government's ability to fund the non-governmental
agencies on which the poorest people of the world depend for
reproductive health care and family planning. Porter is a
regular target of the right wing of his own party. We need
him to continue standing up to Jesse Helms and his anti-
choice cronies, and Porter needs and deserves our support in
his bid for re-election.
Send contributions to:
Porter for Congress
P.O. Box 7126
Deerfield, IL 60015
(847) 948-1212
Georgia's McKinney Faces Tough Election in Redrawn District
A tough environmental advocate from the heart of Gingrich
country, Rep. Cynthia McKinney faces the fight of her
political life as she seeks a third term in the House. In
1992, after serving four years in the state capitol,
McKinney made history as the first African-American woman
ever to be elected by Georgia's voters to the U.S. Congress.
Two years later she won a resounding re-election victory,
racking up 66 percent of the vote. But a recent Supreme
Court redistricting ruling has effectively pulled her home
district out from under her, forcing her to run in
unfamiliar territory and jeopardizing her chances of
returning to Washington in 1997.
McKinney's record on green issues has been outstanding. In
addition to voting consistently against the barrage of anti-
environmental initiatives launched in the 104th Congress,
she has regularly taken the floor to denounce its leaders'
War on the Environment. She cast courageous votes against
both the North American Free Trade Agreement, better known
as NAFTA, and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, or
GATT, and stood firm against legislative attacks on the
Clean Water Act and the National Parks System. She has been
a supporter of increased aid for rural development and
family planning and, from her seat on the House Agriculture
Committee, has helped craft such critical measures as the
1996 Farm Bill.
Now, having proved herself to environmentalists and
constituents alike, McKinney finds herself having to court
an electorate for whom, due to redistricting, she is a new
face. If she's to win over a fresh crop of voters, she'll
need the financial help of those of us who know her record
of unwavering support for the environment.
Send contributions to:
Cynthia McKinney for Congress
P.O. Box 371125
Decatur, GA 30031
(404) 243-5574
Ward Top Advocate for Environment from Bible Belt
In a freshman class dominated by Gingrich spawn, Kentucky's
Mike Ward is a rarity: one of a small handful of newcomers
who went to Washington in 1994 to defend environ- mental
safeguards, not weaken them. One of just 13 first-term
Democrats in the 104th Congress, Ward has compiled the
greenest voting record of any Kentuckian on Capitol Hill.
That record is one reason Ward is a top target of GOP
strategists in the coming elections. But there is another:
He won by just 427 votes in 1994. The pollution lobby smells
blood.
Ward, a former Peace Corps volunteer who served in the
Kentucky legislature for five years, has carried on his long
commitment to environmental protections in the nation's
capital. He voted against the Contract's cornerstone, the so-
called Job Creation and Wage Enhancement Act, with its
dangerous risk-assessment and takings provisions. He voted
against the Dirty Water Bill, and against efforts to slash
EPA funding. But for two missed votes, he would have earned
a perfect score from the League of Conservation Voters.
Ward won his seat in 1994 with 44 percent of the vote in a
three-way race. This time out, he will do battle with
Republican state Rep. Anne Northrup, whose record in the
Kentucky capitol has earned her the financial backing of
corporate PACs with an interest in weakening federal
environmental laws. If we're to keep that from happening in
1997, environmentalists everywhere need to help keep Ward
right where he is: on the side of healthy air, clean water,
wilderness and wildlife.
Send contributions to:
Ward for Congress
MidCity Mall
1250 Bardstown Rd.
Louisville, KY 40204
(502) 473-7777
Minnesota's Wellstone Most Vulnerable Pro-Environment Senator
The most vulnerable pro-environment senator in this election
year, Minnesota's Paul Wellstone is also the most
passionately outspoken on matters of vital concern to all
conservationists. Not only has he maintained a near-perfect
rating from the League of Conservation Voters since 1991,
his first in the Senate, but he has emerged as one of the
upper chamber's true environmental leaders.
Wellstone has been at the vanguard of efforts to protect
Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil drilling.
In his freshman year in the Senate, Wellstone took on some
of the Senate's most powerful members - including J. Bennett
Johnston, then the chair of the Energy and Natural Resources
Committee as well as a fellow Democrat - by leading a
dramatic filibuster against the Johnston-Wallop energy bill,
which would have opened the refuge's coastal plain to
devastating oil-and-gas exploration and development. More
recently he fought successfully to keep the Arctic drilling
provision out of the 1996 budget bill.
Even as a minority member, Wellstone is an especially
crucial voice on the Energy Committee, which has
jurisdiction over a wide spectrum of environmental issues
from the Arctic Refuge to the Utah wilderness, national
parks, energy matters and mining reform. His likely opponent
is former Sen. Rudy Boschwitz, who led efforts to weaken the
Clean Air
Act of 1990 and whom Wellstone barely defeated that year.
But Boschwitz, a wealthy man in his own right, will have the
strong backing of oil companies and others who would like to
send Wellstone back to Minnesota. Environmentalists need to
make sure he stays in Washington.
Send contributions to:
Wellstone for Senate
2309 University Ave. West
St. Paul, MN 55114
(612) 643-0828
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